MANVILLE — Several years after the environmental cleanup was finished, the process is slated to begin in the coming months to remove an area including the Rustic Mall property in Manville from the federal Superfund list of contaminated sites.

But the property owner and borough officials remain at odds over a long-awaited redevelopment of the vacant property.

Rustic Mall LLC, which owns the property, has proposed building apartments there, but the borough has been looking for a mixed-use development that could help revitalize the downtown area on nearby Main Street.

Mayor Angelo Corradino said he is hoping the two sides can reach an agreement, but if no agreement comes together, the borough needs to consider acquiring the property through condemnation and finding a developer interested in a mixed-use project.

“It’s an option we don’t want to use,” Corradino said. “But if we have to, we will.”

The roughly 10-acre tract is part of the 50-acre Federal Creosote site, where contamination was caused by a coal tar wood treatment facility that operated there between about 1911 and 1956. The site was later developed with single-family homes and the mall property, which included a supermarket and other businesses.

The cleanup was completed in late 2008 and early 2009, and federal officials have continued to monitor the site, said Rich Puvogel, remedial project manager at the site for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

In the coming months, the agency expects to publish a notice in the Federal Register, saying it intends to delete the site from the National Priorities List, which is then followed by a 30-day public comment period, Puvogel said. Removal from the list means no further response is needed to protect human health or the environment.

A view of the Rustic Mall property in June 2006. The property is now vacant and awaiting redevelopment.Matt Rainey/The Star-Ledger

Puvogel said redevelopment at a site can occur before it is deleted from the list. At the Federal Creosote site, Puvogel noted how federal officials already have sold 10 of the 18 residential properties purchased as part of the cleanup. Homes have been rebuilt on those 10 properties, he said.

The Manville Borough Council last week adopted a bond ordinance to borrow $340,000 for the acquisition of the eight remaining vacant properties.

As part of a 2006 redevelopment agreement with Rustic Mall, LLC, the borough has been planning to turn over those eight lots to the company for the redevelopment project in exchange for $1 million for a community center project, Borough Administrator Gary Garwacke said.

“I don’t know that to have changed at all,” Garwacke said.

But Anthony Reitano Jr., an attorney representing Rustic Mall, LLC, questioned whether that agreement was still valid with the passage of time, and said the company does not contemplate using those eight lots. The company did not include those properties in the residential proposal submitted to the borough, Reitano said.

The company believes a residential development is the most viable option for the site, Reitano said. The layout of the property makes it best suited for a residential project, he said.

“It’s not a very large parcel as commercial development goes, so the most attractive (development) for this property, in the view of Rustic Mall, is residential,” Reitano said.

In regard to the mayor’s comment about potential condemnation, Reitano said the company understands that any town has the power of condemnation in a redevelopment zone.

Corradino argued that a mixed-use development that included homes and stores at the Rustic Mall property would complement revitalization efforts in the downtown area. Only building apartments at the property would not help Main Street, the mayor said.

“That’s the last big piece of property that we have to develop,” Corradino said. “We have to get it right. There’s no second shot at it.”